The Beginner’s Guide to Customizing Your Employment Background Checks 9 Jan 2019

People like to customize things. After all, customizing allows you to get what you need or want, while saving time and money. One study found 86 percent of people who tried personalization said that customizable options influence what they choose to buy.

Customizing is a great way to get what you want from a product, and background checks are no exception. Customizing background checks helps you get the specific information your business needs. Customizing also helps you stay compliant with a variety of laws, and it gives you more control over your hiring process. But, is customizing your background checks realistic?

In this article, we’ll learn how you can customize your employment background checks. Then, we’ll discover why you should want to customize your background checks.

How Can You Customize Your Employee Background Checks?

Customizing a background check isn’t as simple as selecting your favorite color before clicking “order.” Instead, it’s more like customizing your next computer. An overwhelming number of very specific components and options are available to choose from. Of course, what you choose will affect how well the computer meets your needs.

If you’re a novice at computers, then you’ll need to do your research and identify which components matter to you most. Do you want it to be fast? Look for one with the latest, greatest processor. Thankfully, it’s easier to make the right choice once you know what options you want.

Background checks are no different. To customize one properly, you’ll need to identify which reports are important to you. Some information that you may decide to include are:

• Criminal record searches (federal, state, or county)
• Sex offender registry search
• OFAC or global terrorist search
• Reference verification
• Employment verification
• Education verification
• International criminal background checks
• Address history
• Social security verification
• Credit history

Every job position has its own specific duties that require certain background checks. You can determine what checks the position needs by looking at what duties the job has. If the job involves interacting with clients and other employees, you may want to focus on safety-oriented checks. If the job responsibilities include access to sensitive information, consider checks for fraud. Knowing which background reports you need is a good starting point to customizing your own background checks.

Additionally, some background checks are required by law for specific industries or jobs. For example, educators who work with young children are required to go through a stringent background check process. The transportation industry places strict requirements on driving records, while licensing and malpractice are the focus in health care. You can learn what background checks the law requires for your industry by consulting your lawyer and a reliable background check company.

After you’ve decided what background checks you need to run, it’s time to get rid of the ones you don’t want or aren’t legally required to complete. You also need to use a background check provider that allows you to customize your checks. But, is customizing your background checks really all that important?

Why Should You Customize Your Employee Background Checks?

When you run the right background checks, your hiring process improves. This customization saves you money by getting rid of unnecessary background checks while shortening the time needed to run them.

Failing to customize your background checks can leave you with worthless reports. If you were hiring for a financial sector job and chose an applicant based on driving records, then you’d make the wrong hire. Instead of knowing useful information, like an applicant’s credit report and any history of fraud, you’d get speeding tickets and traffic violations. If you want your background check to help you, you have to customize the check for the job.

Perhaps the biggest benefit of a custom background check is that you’ll know whether a candidate is actually the right fit. By verifying their past employment and education, you’ll be able to confidently tell whether their skills match up with the role. Hiring the right candidate the first time can have an extremely positive effect on team morale, company productivity, and overall profits.

Customizing your background checks gives you the control you need to make the best decisions. But, not every background check provider will allow you to customize. What can you do if that’s the case?

Custom Is Best

People love to customize. It’s no wonder that 86 percent of people who have experienced personalization let it influence their next purchase.

In this article, we learned how to customize employment background checks, what you should include, and why it’s important. If your current background check provider isn’t able to provide the customizations you need, then it may be time for a change.

At Trusted Employees, we offer custom background check packages. Our team of experts can help you decide which background checks you need for your situation. Contact us today to learn more.